25 Online Tools to Run Your Startup

One of our customers recently proclaimed, "Unless you have a tool like this, you won’t be successful in today’s world." That got us thinking... the brilliant startup idea and the enthusiastic workforce are only a few pieces of the puzzle. Startup business owners need software tools — SaaS or otherwise — to stay on top of the game. We asked ourselves: what tools do WE use that help us beat the competition?

So, we've compiled a list for you of our 25 tools we use everyday at Wrike. Check out these products to see if they're what your company needs, and hopefully they'll make your work easier.

Analytics
4. Google Analytics - Created by a company renowned for analyzing every move they make, this tool gathers all of the information you need to analyze your website traffic and more.

Calendar
5. Google Calendar - Since we host our email domain on Google Apps, Google Calendar is an easy way to send event invites, RSVP to meetings, and share our availability. It allows you to view a colleague's schedule on top of your own -- perfect for finding time to schedule a meeting.

Communication
6. Skype - Popular IM, phone, and video conferencing tool. It's our app of choice for instant messaging and hosting team or company meetings. Video calls help us put faces to the names of our remote teammates.

7. GoToMeeting - A web conference tool that allows you to switch speakers, which is great for remote team meetings. We use it to host our monthly all-hands internal meetings, and all our employees can join the call by clicking their personal link.

8. Join.me - If we need to share screens with our coworkers or clients, we can just drop them a join.me link. The viewer only gets access to the part of your screen you decide to share, which helps maintain your privacy while sharing.

CRM
9. Salesforce - One of the most popular CRM tools around for a reason, it organizes your entire prospective customer pipeline from the first sales contact to the close of a deal. You can see every contact and every conversation in one central hub.

Customer Service
10. SnapEngage - As Wrike is a company that prides itself on excellent customer success and real-time support, SnapEngage lets us chat with customers instantly. Our "Live Chat" button lives at the bottom of our Help pages so that people can ask us questions as soon as they come to mind.

11. Desk - Part of the Salesforce suite, it's a simple and easy to use ticketing system. Every time you send an email request to support@team.wrike.com, it immediately goes into Desk so the reps can check it out and get you the information and help you need. A great solution to make sure nothing gets lost in a support email inbox.

File Storage
12. Box - A great cloud file-storage system that allows you to edit docs collaboratively in the cloud. Your personal account gets up to 10GB of free storage, and the security features are geared for the business-minded.

13. Dropbox - Another great cloud file-storage system traditionally aimed at individuals. Files have no size restrictions, and you can get 2GB of free storage space. It's simple, straightforward, and easily syncs with your computer. It's geared for individuals, so you won't be overwhelmed with options.

14. Google Drive - If you already have a Google account, then using Google Drive (formerly Google Docs) is a no-brainer. It's completely free to store and share 15GB of your documents in the cloud. Additionally, you can collaborate with others and edit the documents right on the app.

Email Tracking
15. ToutApp - Ever wonder what happens to your emails once they hit your customers' inboxes? ToutApp will tell you when people open your emails and click your links. It helps you provide customized follow-up, whether that be through another email or a phone call. And it integrates with Gmail, Outlook, and Salesforce -- perfect for us.

Marketing Automation
16. Marketo - They have several products, but we use their tools for automating our emails. You don't have to have ANY tech savvy to create great emails using Marketo, which means our Marketing team doesn't have to bother the Development team in order to get things done.

Media Monitoring
17. Mention - See if your brand has been mentioned anywhere on the web in over 42 languages. Maybe you'll find out that Spanish-speakers love your company, or that everyone in China relies on your tool. You can also connect your social media platforms to react to article mentions without leaving the app — perfect.

Project Management
18. Wrike - Bet you didn't see that one coming. Our favorite project management app helps us fluidly collaborate with our colleagues in the office and across the world.

Screencasts & Screenshots
19. Jing - Take a snapshot of your entire screen, or select a portion of the screen; even capture a video of yourself performing some action. After you pick your image, you can edit it with text, boxes, and arrows to really drive the point home.

Social Media Tools
20. Buffer - Truly an amazing tool for scheduling social media posts on multiple platforms. We've linked our Facebook page, Twitter account, LinkedIn account, and Google Plus account to Buffer... all for free! If we find 10 awesome posts we want to retweet, we can buffer them so we don't bury our Twitter followers in 10 simultaneous updates or lose track of the cool content.

21. Klout - Want to see how important the internet thinks you are? Klout uses social analytics to measure social influencer ratings. It's great for connecting with other influential people on social media channels. We use the handy Chrome extension.

22. Hootsuite - Hootsuite allows you to manage multiple social media accounts (but we find it works best with Twitter). Features include easy tweeting & scheduling, keyword & hashtag tracking, and custom list creation (like Twitter lists) to single out the updates of important influencers.

23. Tweetdeck - Very similar to Hootsuite, Tweetdeck is great for tracking mentions, hashtags, and companies related to your product or industry. Tweetdeck's advantage is that multiple people can log on to the same Twitter handle at once — that means 5 Wrikers responding to your questions instead of one!

URL Shortening
24. Bitly - Everyone knows it shortens URLs, but we love using it to track how many clicks we're getting on the links we post. It helps us analyze our messaging and our social media placement.

Webinars
25. GoToWebinar - All of our webinars, from the "Wrike Introduction" for newbies to our popular "Productivity Hacks" webinar, are hosted using GoToWebinar. Attendees just have to click a link to join a session. They can submit questions, and the host can read and answer them during the webinar. It also generates reports to show how many people logged in, the level of audience engagement, and more.

Do you use any of these tools? Is your favorite app missing from our list?

Let us know in the comments, and share this list with your friends or colleagues who are looking to take better advantage of the apps available to them!